Pompeii Had Some Intense Rush Hour Traffic Too

What was rush hour traffic like in the ancient city of Pompeii? Turns out, it was probably just as noisy, frustrating and dangerous as it is today.

In a new book out this month, Pompeii archaeologist Eric Poehler uncovers the traffic patterns within the ancient Italian city. By examining the small scratches, ruts and potholes along the streets of the city, Poehler has brought new knowledge of how carts, wagons and people used and interacted with the streets of the classical city every day. The historic growth of a city's roadsystem is itself a reflection of the ideas, ideals, laws and people that pulsed within a community and the economy that underpinned it.

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A first century CE Roman relief shows a cart of a triumphing general likely as he processes through Rome. The terra cotta relief is now at the British Museum.

How do we reconstruct the motion of the past? Ephemeral parts of ancient history such as food, sound, smell and motion are integral to our understanding of what day-to-day life was like when accessing the past, which is why archaeologists have labored for many years to understand how goods and services flowed along roadways in antiquity. Pompeii's history of traffic and the archaeological record that transmits clues to the motion within it begins in the sixth century BCE and extends until the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 CE.

Almost 600 years of traffic history lay below the ash when archaeologists began to excavate the site. While there was occupation in the 6th century BCE, the archaic road system did not begin to come together as a cohesive plan until the 4th century BCE. These roads worked in tandem with the gates and newly constructed fortification walls that hemmed Pompeii in. As the city grew, traffic patterns and street systems often reacted to the building of new monuments or entertainment areas: the construction of the Stabian Baths, the Samnite Palestra and the building of the Large Theater of Pompeii would all cause shifts in the urban grid.

Well into the later occupation period, the forum and the Macellum (market) was the central focus of the city; just as farmers markets, shopping malls and grocery stores are heavily trafficked areas today. By the first century CE, Pompeii had 79 (modern) named streets that needed to be memorized by visitors, taxi litters and residents. This is about 1% of what taxi drivers in central London need to learn today.

Water was a much more integral part of the streets in antiquity. Constantly flowing water from fountains placed all over the city were an important part of Roman streets often forgotten today. Poehler notes that during the reign of the emperor Augustus (31 BCE-14CE): "The presence of this constant flow of hundreds of thousands of liters of water provided some impetus to pave more of the streets in lava stone and to further canalize them between high curbs. The use of stepping stones also dramatically expanded in the Augustan age." The curbs were quite high at Pompeii, which meant you definitely needed to be careful walking along the edges. There were stepping stones and crossing areas for pedestrians placed in the roadway, but people certainly fell into the street and some were even struck by runaway carts.

Joanne Berry

View from the House of the Vettii at Pompeii, showing stepping stones to cross the street so that pedestrians could avoid stepping in water and muck.

A number of literary references, reliefs and even surviving wagons give us an idea of the types of transport used in antiquity. Romans often rode in wagons and carts through the streets, which could collectively be called vehicula. This is where we get the modern word "vehicle." There were ox-wagons called a plaustrum or a two-wheeled carpentum, which was led by mules. A four-wheeler drawn by mules was called a carrus, the etymological basis for the later word "carriage" today. Wealthy Romans could also be conveyed through the streets in a litter, which kept them far above the muck, water, dog excrement and refuse that could often litter a street.

As Poehler points to, just as today in the streets of Manhattan, noise pollution was a part of living within any urban center--Pompeii included. The Roman satirist Juvenal discussed the problem in the streets of Rome (Satires, III.236-238): "The wagons thundering past through those narrow twisting streets, the oaths of draymen caught in a traffic-jam, would rouse a dozing seal—or an emperor." There were indeed laws meant to cut down on traffic and noise within the city, but it is hard to determine to what extent these rules were followed. Noise ordinances are notoriously hard to enforce.

Eric Poehler

Map of the wear on the streets of Pompeii. Map by Eric Poehler, 2017. The Traffic Systems of Pompeii. New York: Oxford University Press.

Just like today, traffic laws were often broken by citizens. The book is a reminder that just because a Roman (or American) law exists, it doesn't mean people followed it. Historians cannot take the existence of a law as a testament to the fact that people actually observed it. As Poehler notes, "One of the most oft-cited ideas about ancient vehicles is the notion that with only a few exceptions, they were banned from cities during the daytime, leaving urban areas to pedestrians."Problems of language and use aside, it is likely that this rule was not followed absolutely.

In the book, Poehler discovers that a key part of the traffic system at Pompeii is the use of one-way streets: "One-lane streets are 84% of the named streets, 69% of the block-length street segments, and 66% of the total excavated street length and an estimated 77% of the total street network. However one calculates the percentage of narrow streets, for the ancient cart driver, the experience was the same: one enters Pompeii on a two-way street and almost any turn off of it leads into the confined space and reduced directionality of a one-lane street." By 79 CE, the city was not very amenable to wheeled vehicles. Lots of one-way streets meant that bad drivers or ones just in a hurry to get to their destination could often be at a wagon standoff that required lots of difficult reversals. The danger of traffic jams or even cart crashes was endemic.

Overall, study of Pompeii's traffic systems shows that analyzing the traffic of antiquity can indeed give us insight into the necessities of city planning today. Many of the same problems encountered in the Roman world can be found on the roads of Pompeii, whether it is evidence for congestion or the annoyances of potholes and construction zones. What The Traffic Systems of Pompeii illuminates is that traffic regulations, infrastructure concerns and even vehicle deaths were as much a part of the lives of those living in the ancient city as they are now. Although the scale, the vehicles and the cuss words may differ, ancient traffic jams were not all that different from our own. Pompeians may or may not have had a few more asini (asses) to deal with.

Eric Poehler

The Porta Ercolano (Herculaneum Gate) of Pompeii, The Traffic Systems of Pompeii. New York: Oxford University Press.

Sarah E. Bond is an Assistant Professor of Classics at the University of Iowa. For more on ancient and medieval history, follow her @SarahEBond.